Sibelius described one German bombardment like “a crescendo that lasted 30 hours. Sibelius and his family escaped to Helsinki to take refuge at the psychiatric hospital at which his brother was a senior doctor. In 1918 Russian soldiers entered Sibelius’ hometown, searched Sibelius’ house and shot one of his neighbours. The symphony was originally composed in 1915 it was revised in 19, around the time of both World War I and the Russian Revolution. Sibelius was commissioned to write the symphony by the Finnish government in honour of his 50th birthday, 8 December 1915, which had been declared a national holiday. In the horns, you can almost hear the beating of great white wings, as the wind instruments sing out a full-throated melody. “ strange to learn”, he said “that nothing in the whole world affects me-nothing in art, literature, or music-in the same way as do these swans.”Ī magnificently transformed version of this ‘swan theme’ forms the majestic and imposing climax at the end of the symphony. Disappeared into the solar haze like a silver ribbon." God, what beauty! They circled over me for a long time. Ilkka Oramo is Professor of Music Theory at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki.In his diary, Sibelius noted the inspiration for the grand theme for this symphony: "Today I saw 16 swans. Sibelius struggled with his fifth symphony for about seven years, and although he attempted to ensure that the score of his original 1915 score did not survive. As if God the Father had thrown down pieces of mosaic out of the heaven's floor and asked me to solve how the picture once looked." The two basic themes of the movement, one in stepwise motion in the woodwinds doubled by the cellos and the other moving in widening intervals in the horns (the "swan hymn"), sound on top of each other, while the latter is accompanied by itself at a third of the speed in the bass. This important preoccupation with its mystery and fascination. The triumphant final movement, Allegro molto, contains a particularly beautiful example of what Sibelius meant by writing in his diary on April 10, 1915: "In the evening with the symphony. It was recorded and released by the Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Osmo. Sibelius struggled with his fifth symphony for about seven years, and although he attempted to ensure that the score of his original 1915 score did not survive, the orchestral parts certainly did. The movement is a kind of Sampo, the mythical machine of the Finnish national epic Kalevala that creates wealth and prosperity to anybody holding it. Reviewed in the United States on March 23, 2010. In a way it is, but its purpose in the Symphony is to mediate between the two outer movements by gradually generating, in seven "rotations," the main elements of the finale, its woodwind first theme and the "swan hymn," here in pizzicato strings. The high point of the movement is the gradual and almost imperceptible transition from the hollow space of slow and somber music to the lithe and vivid scherzo that finally adopts a hectic character in an ever-faster stretto.Īfter the intriguing first movement, the second, Andante mosso, quasi allegretto, may appear simplistic. The exposition and development consist of three relatively short "rotations" and lead to a very large "recapitulatory space" with a scherzo character. The three areas of sonata form - exposition, development, and recapitulation - are still there, but their dimensions and mutual relationship depart radically from the customary. The result is an original transformation of the sonata principle that has no precedent in the tradition. The first movement, Tempo molto moderato Allegro moderato (ma poco a poco stretto), was born out of a fusion of two originally independent movements.
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